


My Introduction to Changing the World

by KiannaLeigh



Category: Original Work
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Demi-Gods, Gen, Magic, Magical Artifacts, Magical Bond, Near Future, Supernatural - Freeform, Superpowers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-15
Updated: 2016-09-15
Packaged: 2018-08-15 06:04:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8045173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KiannaLeigh/pseuds/KiannaLeigh
Summary: Set in a future not so distant from today, a person is given a gift by a stranger. But, it's less a gift and more pawning off a very demanding teacher and mentor. The voice says the person is worthy. But worthy of what?





	My Introduction to Changing the World

**Author's Note:**

> Based on a writing prompt from The Prompt Guy himself at http://writing-prompt-s.tumblr.com
> 
> The actual prompt used can be found here:  
> http://writing-prompt-s.tumblr.com/post/147685945786/one-day-while-you-are-walking-home-from-work-a

In the unbearably hot mid-July air of New York City, no one paid very much attention to anyone else. I mean maybe in the old days people didn’t rush from one air conditioned building to another, but in the old days climate change could still be “debunked” by scientists with no morals, and the original streets of New York weren’t underwater.

But it wasn’t the old days. Climate change was in the history books, central heating and cooling was a federal building code mandate and July was not one of the four months that could comfortably be spent outside. People, including me, walked with earbuds in and with purpose towards where they needed to be.

That’s why when someone stopped in front of me and shoved a little package into my chest, I was surprised more than scared. I even jumped to put my arms up so that the package wouldn’t fall to the ground. The depositor was a hangered looking young man, with nice clothes and a tired expression.

“Oh my fucking god,” he muttered. He a slightly foreign accent, maybe British. A lot of British people had come to America when their homeland started to disappear beneath the Atlantic. “It’s so bloody annoying!” His raspy voice was definably British and suddenly looked up from the package at me. His grey eyes were only mildly disturbing. Mostly he looked exhausted, and only a little crazy. That’s probably why I didn’t drop the package and run. “It won’t fucking shut up,” he hissed and then moved past me and walked away as fast as his sluggish movements could carry him.

I watched him move down the block - narrowly avoiding bumping into someone as he turned a corner – and disappear, before looking down at the package. It wasn’t a proper package, really. Just a bundle all wrapped up in soft but sort of dirty material, like old linen for a mummy’s bandages. I held it a little closer to my face and turned it gently. It was lumpy, old-looking, and struck me as being trash. At least it didn’t smell, but decided without much thought that I was going to dump it in the very next trash bin and continue on my way. However, I had hardly begun to look up from the package when there was a voice.

“Finally,” it said. It was deep, almost echoing voice, that sounded like it was coming from deep underground. Only it wasn’t; it was coming from inside my head. The voice chuckled slowly, and deep in its throat. “Someone worthy.”

The decision to take home the package was driven by two forces. One was, admittedly, curiosity.

“You have no idea how boring people can be,” the voice with a smallest hint of irritation detectable in its tone. “But I can see a spark in you. Wait until you figure out how to use it properly.”

“Use what?” I asked out loud.

“Shh,” the voice said. “There’s a policeman behind you. I wouldn’t want something happening to you. Not now that I’ve found you.”

I glanced over my shoulder to find a police officer was standing a couple of feet behind me, watching me through narrowed eyes. I wasn’t sure how I hadn’t noticed it before but that was the same somebody, that the exhausted British man had nearly run into. Whatever he thought had happened between us, I didn’t want to give him a reason to talk to me. That brings me to the second force. Fear.

I tucked the package into my messenger bag and started walking, trying to match my pace from before, focused but not rushing. Walking with purpose. I was happy to get to my building and lock the door of my apartment behind me. At least I wasn’t getting arrested that day.

“Good work,” the voice complimented me. “Now let’s get down to business. Clear a table and put me in the middle of it. I need my altar.”

“You are a bossy voice in my head.”

“You need teaching and I have little patience. An altar please.”

“Fine,” I muttered. “Voices in my head,” I went on as I kicked off my shoes and went to clear the coffee table. “Crazy people dumping old lumpy package into my arms.” I moved to my coffee table and started cleaning it up of last night’s dinner and this morning’s breakfast. “And of course there had to be a fucking cop right there. It’s not like it was drugs. Drugs, I’d just go pick up at UPS. It’s not 2016 anymore. Fucking pig. And how the fuck am I supposed to build an altar? I don’t know shit about building altars.”

“A plain table devoted to housing me will do to start! And by the way, you’ve got chocolate melting in the bottom of your bag.”

“Fuck!”

I dropped all the trash from the table in the kitchen and went back to the living room to sit down on the sofa in front of my coffee table. After putting the linen package down on it and clearing out my bag, I found a couple of open, half-eaten sticks of Lindor chocolate melting into a stain on my bag.

“It’s fine,” the voice said. “Scoop it up with your hands and place it on my altar. It can be an offering.”

“That is a surprisingly practical piece of advice, coming from the demonic voice in my head.”

“I’m not a demon,” the voice corrected, tiredly. “Humans. You call everything a demon. Do you understand how rare demons are? And how they are made? You’ll be lucky to see … three or four of them every hundred-”

“Should I just dump this on the table or…?”

“Set it before me. I’ll take care of it. Now unwrap me.”

“Bossy, bossy,” I muttered, but it did as I was told.

I’m not sure what I was expecting to find under that dirty linen, but a little animal skull was not it. It looked like a buffalo skull, only tiny and black.

“And he said he wasn’t a demon,” I muttered. “Okay voice, what now?”

“Now, place your hands, dirtied from your offering, upon my skull.”

The skull was tiny, so actually just put my fingertips on it, but I felt the chocolate get sucked off my hands into the skull. The chocolate on the table slithered up to join it.

“Fuck, that’s gross,” I whispered.

“Your offering is accepted,” the voice told me and the skull grew. It was about the size of a real buffalo skull. Or what I imagine a real buffalo skull to the size of. “You may remove your hands. Now my power is yours. The more you use it, the more you will have.”

“I wish my money was like that.”

“Oh, please no.”

“Excuse me?”

“Humans are dull. They think in such little terms. Money, houses, clothes. Do you know how often human use my power for that? You are worthy! You have potential. Don’t squander it building petty fortunes.”

“So what exactly is your power?”

“Everything. Anything you want, you can have. Anything you wish, can be.”

“Anything?”

“Anything.”

I raised my eyebrow and sat back on the sofa. I wasn’t sure how I was going to do what I wanted. I wasn’t sure I hadn’t just fallen when the British man bumped into me and this wasn’t some coma dream. But I’d seen some magical girl anime. I was half-confident I could wing it.

I started small, and imagined a piece of jewelry. A bracelet and five rings – one for each finger – for my right hand, all connected by fine strong chains, and jeweled with rubies – my birthstone. When it appeared, better and more detailed than I imagined, I smiled.

“You need only an idea,” the voice said tiredly. “The magic will work out the details. But why jewelry of all things?”

“I need a magical item to channel my powers through,” I explained.

“No you-“

“It’ll help me focus! Shut up and let me work.”

I sat back again and focus on a spot in the air between the outside edge of the coffee table and TV. If I only needed an idea and magic would work out the rest, then I figured it wouldn’t be hard use this power.

And I was right. As soon as I decided what I wanted, there it was. There he was.

A man, tall with dark skin, white hair and lavender eyes. He wore a suit of pale purple that matched his eyes and polished black shoes. His forehead was adorned with little horns. The skull was gone from the table.

“I did good,” I muttered.

The voice, now a man, looked confused, first at me, then at down at himself.

“What … have you done?” he asked.

I frowned. “Okay. That voice has to be toned down a little.”

“Toned…!?” He touched his throat, surprised to sound more human. “How did you do this?”

“You said I could do anything, everything. And say I want to learn to do anything and everything? I can’t be walking around holding a skull talking to myself. I’ll call you … The Professor, after The Doctor.”

The Professor looked at me. He still looked a little like a demon, but he also looked like he was going to cry. “No one has thought to give me form in thousands of years.”

“Okay. Did I do something wrong? I mean, you said I could do anything I wanted so-“

“Do you know how many humans would put money in their accounts and set me aside? Do you know on how many humans the true potential of my power is lost? But your first task is to make something from nothing.”

“Just outright, I’m not in trouble am I?”

“No. You’re not in trouble. You can’t change the past, I must warn you. But anything else is fair game.” He smiled.

I stared at him a moment, then stood up in my new body. It was taller, more muscular, stronger. I could definite pick up that cute girl at the bookshop and do squats with her as a weight.

The Professor seemed pleased with my new look and to show him some thanks in advance I made him a proper altar over in the corner of my dining room with drawings of him throughout history, and replica of his skull, and everything. He grinned.

“Okay,” I said as a watched him. “Cool. But truthfully I like my apartment. We’re going to have to go somewhere else for practice.”

“Anywhere you want,” he told me.

I nodded and we were upstate in the Adirondacks, both of us dressed for walk in the woods. The only thing missing was the hiking gear, since I figured we wouldn’t be needed it. I looked up and found an overcast sky which I immediately banished in favor of sunshine and light fluffy clouds.

“Let’s go for a walk,” I said.

“Sure,” The Professor said with a shrug. “I haven’t been able to walk around in four thousand years. I could use the exercise. Mind making a path?”

I laid out a trail of gleaming aqua-colored brick in front of us, just wide enough for the two of us and lined with flowers and little fish going from flower to flower in place of bees.

The Professor smirked. “Very nice. This is going to be easy.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be flash-fiction but those of you who read my writing know getting low word counts isn't something I'm good at. But I hope you liked this.


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